


Welcome to the Village

by spikesgirl58



Category: The Prisoner (1967)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-10
Updated: 2016-05-10
Packaged: 2018-06-07 15:00:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 823
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6810175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spikesgirl58/pseuds/spikesgirl58
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's having nightmares again and he decides a vacation is just what he needs, but it may well be too little too late.  Written for the Obscure and British Commentfest.  For healyg  and the prompt:  The Prisoner (1967 series), Number 6, he still has nightmares about The Village</p>
            </blockquote>





	Welcome to the Village

"What do you want?"

"Information."

"Well, you won’t get it?"

"By hook or by crook, we will."

"Who’s No. One."

"You **are** , No. Six."

"NO!"

He screamed the last word as he saw an image of himself, overlook his brainwashed flock in The Village. He fought his way clear of the tangle of sheets and bedclothes and stood, chest heaving, looking around his small London flat.

It wasn’t all that different from the flat he used to have – before… before everything went wrong. Before he resigned and was punished by being sent to that place, a place designed to suck the very marrow from him. He’d fought and he’d won, but at a tremendous cost.

He glanced over at a picture, its glass, much as his marriage, cracked in half. He couldn’t blame Margaret. She’d worked hard to make a life with him afterwards… worked through the paranoia, the anxiety, and the never-ending nightmares. Finally, in the end it had been too much and she’d left him. Perhaps she would have stayed longer if he hadn’t attacked her one night, thinking she was sent from The Village to spy on him. He’d nearly killed her then. He didn’t fight the divorce, letting her have the house. It was merely a shell for him anyway. His life was in London.

He made some tea and glanced at the clock. It was early, even earlier than he usually woke for work. Work, he smirked at the word. He’d been a top level spy, one of the best in the country, hell, probably in the world until he’d burned out and quit. He should have known then that you never really quit. **They** wouldn’t let you.

It had taken forever, but he found work at a small accounting firm. There he had no secrets to tell, no stolen plans to sell and he was content. Well, content enough, until the nightmares started ramping up.

He began coming to work late or calling in sick until the management gave him an ultimatum – take a week and get his head together or else start looking for employment elsewhere.

He was packed and eager to get out on the road, away from London, away from everywhere. To those means, he’d booked a room at a small hotel in a small town in the small country of Wales. That was as far as he allowed himself to run. Perhaps there he could finally heal

****

It was nearly dusk by the time he made the turn onto the small bumpy road. The people at the gate directed him around by a back road for no vehicles were permitted except those headed for the hotel. He liked the sound of that. Just peace and quiet. He’d nearly stopped at a large manor house for dinner, but decided to push on the last few meters. If the hotel was as close as he thought, he might well stroll back here for a drink. He could sit on the patio, look out over the rolling fields and let the silence wash over him. It was so quiet here.

He motored down past brightly-painted houses and smiled at the esoteric rainbow scheme. It was as if someone either completely color blind or high on some drug had been in charge of the paint selection. He laughed about it, just a bit too loud, for it teased a half forgotten memory – a memory he refused to ever again acknowledge. He was determined to put The Village behind him. This was the start of his new beginning.

The road dipped and the hotel and its town suddenly loomed ahead. It was all he could do to keep from running off the road.

"No, it’s not possible." He slammed the parking brake on and tumbling from the car, legs splayed to keep from collapsing. "It can’t be!" he screamed at the all too-familiar sight of the hospital, the sprawling mud flats beyond, the lawn with its brightly-colored chess board, and the green dome, the terrible green dome, home to No. Two. "No, it can’t be! It can’t be!"

****

"How is he doing, Doctor?" The policeman peeked over the physician’s shoulder at the dark-haired man. Even with drugs and a strait jacket, the man writhed on the floor, moaning and sobbing.

"I’ve contacted my contemporaries in Cardiff. He will be transported down there in the morning. Perhaps they can make something out of his wild story. We will probably never really know what made him snap like that."

"They found him out on the mud flats, screaming something about being a free man." The policeman snorted. "At what price freedom, eh, Doc?"

"Yes, at what price?" The doctor turned to his assistant, a man of small stature, but of commanding presence all the same. "Please try to make Mr. Drake as comfortable as possible."

The small man smiled and nodded solemnly. It was good to have No. Six home.

　

　

　


End file.
